Below is a scan of a transportation ticket. Some of the writing on the ticket has been digitally removed. Can you identify what type of ticket this is and what city it is from?

(Bonus Question: What station was this purchased at?)

Did you guess Paris, France? If so, then you're right!

Parisians have been using the Paris Métropolitain (nicknamed the "Métro") since the first line opened way back in April of 1900. Some 100 years later, the system has 124 miles (199 km) of track and 15 lines. There are 368 stations (not including RER stations), 87 of these being interchanges between lines. Every building in Paris is within 550 yards (500 metres) of a métro station. There are 3,500 cars which transport roughly 6 million people per day. There are 15,000 employees of the métro (1989 statistics).

If you got the question right, I'm guessing that you've been to Paris and you've seen the Métro system... but have you looked at your Métro ticket? I mean really studied it. I turned to my friend Jeff, webmaster for the Métro-phile site métro-pole.net, to help decypher the types of stamps, numbers, and letters you can get on a métro ticket as you go through the turnstiles. I sent Jeff the a few of my old métro tickets to see how much he could tell me about them. I told him nothing about the tickets. Here's what he told me.

"You used this ticket on Métro line 244, most likely at the Porte Maillot station, on September 27th, 2001 around 11:00am in the morning. How did I know this? Let's look at it more in-depth."

"Before a ticket has been purchased, it has been stamped with a special code to keep foregeries from being created. After you use the ticket by sliding it through the turnstile or on a bus validator, a special code unique to that ticket validator is stamped onto the ticket. On the ticket shown below, I can tell the following."

Label #1- BCY - stands for "Bercy", as in the Bercy Métro station.
Label #2- A25 - It was issued from ticketing terminal #25 (which, I suspect, is an automated vending machine).
Label #3- 244 - you used your ticket on Bus line 244.
Label #4- 10412 - This is a unique number for each validator which changes periodically to keep counterfits to a minimum.
Label #5- 02 - I think this number is the zone in which the ticket was stamped (zone 2 would be the first outside Paris, between Porte Maillot and Pont de Suresnes on line 244).
Label #6- 27/10/01 11h01 - The date & time of the trip.

Thank you, Jeff, for your insight into the Parisian Métro tickets.

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